


Made Me Live Again

by bulfinch



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale is "just enough of a bastard to be worth knowing" (Good Omens), Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Heaven is terrible, Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens), Mostly Fluff, Oh the tales the Bentley could tell (but no actually that car is the soul of discretion), Perhaps a smidgen of emotional hurt/comfort, Playful swatting at a demon’s pert backside, Smutty lil’ treats in the footnotes, so soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-28
Updated: 2021-02-28
Packaged: 2021-03-12 02:27:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29752689
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bulfinch/pseuds/bulfinch
Summary: Aziraphale was all patience, all praise, all reassurance. Coaxing Crowley out from the cage of his own defences with gentle fingers and adoring eyes.And, settled in now to the quiet melody of their retirement, the angel became more unguarded, more easy with himself, too. Aziraphale’s nature couldn't help but shine through eons of self-doubt, of imposed restraint. What Crowley had always maintained was still true as ever, and Aziraphale began, inch by inch, to let his wicked side wander on occasion. Delightful and delicious and decadent. Relieved, Crowley often thought, not to have to be Good.Or Aziraphale learns that being a wee bit of a bastard is a lovely thing indeed.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 37





	Made Me Live Again

**Author's Note:**

> This one sat on the back burner for what has felt like an age, simmering like a stew. I’m now serving it with a little trepidation. Hope it turned out well.

Crowley, before his retirement, had been quite adept at his trade, with a considerable and, he thought, rather brilliant body of work to show for it. Certainly, he had not exactly been a company man. Willing to hustle a little for the competitors if it meant a bit more comfort, a little more convenience, and freedom to indulge in all the fun this strange, sloppy, wondrous Earth had to offer.1

But Aziraphale had never been a particularly good angel. He had worked his miracles, but never with much acclaim. His benevolence, when used for official purposes, was usually of a fumbling sort. It was rarely directed in its most natural form at those reverent and important creatures he was supposed to instil with the blessing of divine inspiration, and certainly never at his own customers. But when it was given freely, it was a warm and exuberant and lovely thing. 

Playwrights going through a bit of a dry spell had not, strictly speaking, been in the professional purview of the principality. But Aziraphale had taken a shine to Bill and, Crowley could admit (though he probably wouldn’t, still sore that he had been roped along) that the world was better for it. Aziraphale, more often than not, was best at giving blessings to those he simply liked. And wasn’t kindness for its own simple sake so much more decent than Goodness?

Aziraphale liked much of humanity. He liked children with sweet hearts and mischief in their toothless grins. He liked young ladies with gumption. He liked young men who were a little too soft for the hardness the world expected of them. He liked elderly gentlemen who groused about the weather and whose bones and eyes ached with the ghosts of old war wounds, sturdy middle-aged women who were too tired to give a toss. He liked starving artists and hard working cooks. And people who defied neat categories all together. 

He liked his barber. And his tailor. The baker down the street. 

But he _loved_ Crowley. And, now that he could, now that he was free to do so, Aziraphale showered his demon in the brilliance of his kindness. As if a dam had burst and a flood of swallowed words and aborted gestures, saved up like want over eons, was spilling out of him. 

Crowley, more often than not, was left breathless by it. Amazed to have the utter and certain _tragedy_ of this love, a stone of hopelessness he had carried about with him through the millennia, proven wrong again and again and again, subverted into open joy. 

Aziraphale was all patience, all praise, all reassurance. Coaxing Crowley out from the cage of his own defences with gentle fingers and adoring eyes. 

And, settled in now to the quiet melody of their retirement, the angel became more unguarded, more easy with himself, too. Aziraphale’s nature couldn't help but shine through eons of self-doubt, of imposed restraint. What Crowley had always maintained was still true as ever, and Aziraphale began, inch by inch, to let his wicked side wander on occasion. Delightful and delicious and decadent. Relieved, Crowley often thought, not to have to be Good.

Once, they had decided to take a country drive. No clandestine plans. No fate of the world hanging in the balance. No _need_ for an excuse. Just the Bentley winding out of London and, by and by, through narrow, green-hedged lanes. Past patches of old stone and the new growth of Spring.

They stopped into a little cafe on their way through a village high street. Crowley chatted with the barista while they waited, Aziraphale pouring over the lines of a map they didn't need.2 The demon felt a kind of pleasant buzz at the easiness of it all. To just banter over the steam of the cappuccino machine in this place he had entered holding Aziraphale’s hand. 

The barista offered an introduction. And Crowley did the same. But before anything along the lines of “Anthony J. Crowley, pleased to meet you.” could be uttered, “Tony” skipped ahead and slipped past his lips. 

And why not? It seemed to fit the moment. Casual as an undone shirt collar. 

But as soon as it was there, hanging in the air, Crowley could feel Aziraphale trying to train his eyes on his map, to keep his face straight, his lips in a tight line. He said nothing, though, and Crowley let himself feel a little smug. 

But, eventually, as they turned to leave, prim and proper as a schoolmaster: “Come along, _Tony_.” The angel was smirking like an imp. And Crowley wanted to lick that blessed drawl out of his mouth. To silence him with with his tongue and let his hands, running down, down, down supple flesh, make him stammer out something more reverent.3

The world had turned through its slow dance into autumn again. Steady like the rhythm of the rain pattering softly against antique panes. 

And Crowley had found himself nestled safely on the sofa in the empty bookshop as daylight tempered itself into the mellowness of night. He had been motionless on his perch so long that he had become part of a background, would startle a passerby if he moved. 

A dangerous emotion overcame the demon: boredom. 

Of course it wasn’t strictly accurate to call it that. Crowley could have watched Aziraphale for hours, steady unblinking gaze following his form as it wandered through the stacks, hidden and revealed in turns. He could have watched prim, elegant hands caress cracked leather almost as carefully as they caressed Crowley’s own skin— _almost_ —for ages. 

More appropriately, this was restlessness, an urge to unfurl long limbs, to become sudden movement instead of patient stillness. 

And so he set about trying to sway his angel from his purpose. Poking and prodding as Aziraphale re-arranged his shelves. Sauntering after him. Leaning temptingly in the way. Raising eyebrows and making lurid suggestions. 

He could see a shimmering in the blue of his gaze, belying the sternness the angel tried to affect there. Crowley was definitely winning. But just as the demon began to grin, confident that he would shortly be accepting his luscious adversary’s delicious surrender, Aziraphale slipped past him with an “Out of my way, you naughty thing,” brushing close and…

And did Aziraphale just… _spank_ him? 

_SPANK_? 

The demon was left gaping, delighted and astonished all at once. 

By the time Crowley began to recover his senses, Aziraphale’s whole frame was shaking with laughter. The angel glanced over his shoulder, smile full of a loving and sweet wickedness that made Crowley want to laugh and cry and do _cartwheels_ to see it. It had hid itself away for fear of punishment. Been told in no uncertain terms that it _would not do_. Lived in shame and secrecy for _so long_. 

And now here it was: Aziraphale at his best and brightest, all himself. Imperfect and glowing with it. 

Aziraphale, tuned, gave up all pretence, pulled Crowley closer, wrapped his arms around him. His eyes crinkled with mirth. And there was that kindness in them, also, all for Crowley. Directed without a second thought, unwittingly, unreservedly, at _him_.4

But now, they were in the aftermath of a long, drawn-out bliss. It had been slow and languid, revelling in all the time in the world. They lay tangled in each other and in the nest of rumpled covers that had twisted around them. 

Crowley’s tousled head was tucked in the crook of a shoulder, long fingers idly tracing over the soft planes of a lovely chest, pausing to feel the heart beating beneath, the timbre of Aziraphale’s voice humming through his own chest where it pressed into the angel’s side. Crowley, in turn, was being held like a cherished thing. 

Words danced aimlessly between them, flitting from loving praises to saucy solicitations to idle musings and back again. All banter about nothing in particular at all. 

“Y’know.” said Crowley, a saunter in his voice. “I’m still rather proud of some of the old work. Oh, not all of it. But _polyester_ …now that was a stroke of genius. Everyone sweating and uncomfortable and still so _pleased_ to be wrinkle free.” 

That won Crowley a laugh. 

“Does that scandalize you, angel?” teased the demon, expecting to be teased back, to be called a “fiend” in a tone that sounded far too much like affection, accompanied by a gaze that was a little too close to sin itself. 

Aziraphale chuckled again but then went pensive. Held on to something for a moment, then set it free on a murmur. 

“It’s better” he said, “than regret, than being sorry.” 

Crowley’s brows furrowed. “Aziraphale…” Softly, “What are you sorry for?” 

It was quiet a moment and then, honest and frank, and bare as stone, “For all the things I’ve _done_ in the name of Goodness.” Aziraphale turned to him then, the slate-blue of his eyes full with an ancient burden. “For everything I didn’t do.”

And Crowley knew. He had been there too. He remembered the thousand justifications about ineffability, and holiness, and duty. He remembered the tense set of shoulders, the pained and conflicted eyes, trained bitterly on heavenly horrors. As if it were his punishment to watch. _Look at what you have wrought._

Crowley remembered, too, the forgiveness that was begged, not so long ago. 

_They had been in the bookshop, the world sleeping outside, and the elation of their victory ebbing into something softer and more dangerous. More precious and momentous. Crowley had stood, turned to leave. Feigning an easiness he didn’t feel, biting back the thousand things he wanted to say. Ready to flee like a startled bird from the possibility of leaving his weary heart naked, unadorned with pride._

_A hand was on his wrist, then, soft and so warm Crowley had wanted to weep for it all._

_“I’m sorry, Crowley. So terribly sorry. I was so afraid. I-I couldn’t let…” Aziraphale trailed off, trying to speak order into the chaos of his heart. And then there had been those eyes. Shimmering like the first oceans, brilliant in the dim light. Offering everything. “I_ love _you.”_

_And that had been more than clear enough._

Just as he had that night, Crowley kissed kindness into Aziraphale’s skin. The demon’s hands trailed understanding over shivering flesh. Promising that there was nothing to forgive. _I know. I know._ Promising him a new kind of eternity. Pouring a fierce fealty into every brush of their lips, their tangled limbs. 

Trading out all the old, lofty hurt of Heaven for the simple, earthly pleasures of love. 

“I _love_ you” Aziraphale was crooning again. But this time it was not full of an anguished pleading. This time it was breathed out like peace. 

“I love you,” replied Crowley, echoing Aziraphale like a shadow, shinning like devotion. 

Because Aziraphale deserved devotion. Deserved to know that love did not come with conditions and exceptions and regulations. Because Aziraphale had shown that freely to Crowley in a thousand, thousand ways since they came together.

So there would be no more never-Good-enough. No more not-allowed-to-want. No more not-allowed-to-be. Just Aziraphale. And just Crowley. And just the plain and certain truth of what they were. And, for _Somebody’s sake_ , wasn’t that more dazzling than anything else they could ever try to be? 

  1. And most off all—only—if it meant he had an excuse to stand a whisper’s distance from a certain angel, to watch the corners his eyes crinkle when he smiled, to let the timber of his voice flow through him like wine. To bask in any wayward warmth from his not-close-enough skin.
  2. The glove compartment had coughed it up earlier. Crowley did not have the heart to tell Aziraphale, who had taken it up eagerly (a nifty and helpful thing to do), that it had probably been tucked in there since the early 50s and was likely woefully out of date.
  3. Not seventeen minutes later, they had pulled to the side of the road, up some disused trail, grown over and deeply shaded.A belt had been pulled out of its loops with a clumsy flourish, and now lay snaking across the dashboard. A pair of sunglasses had skittered under a seat, taking cover from the storm.Even with more room than should rightly be allowed within the car, feet were braced awkwardly on seat backs and windows, knobby knees crammed without forethought into whatever corner would accommodate them. 

Eventually, Aziraphale found himself gripping at Crowley’s coat for purchase, one leg adorned in nothing but a tartan sock, a pair of trousers hanging off the other.

Crowley could feel sweat sucking his shirt to his back, beading at his hairline. Aziraphale was biting his lip red, trying desperately to keep from crying out as Crowley, merciless and adoring, pounded into his prostate again, again, again. Flushed and breathless and glorious.

“N—ah—no one can hear you here,” said Crowley, voice rough with effort. “Let go, angel.”

Aziraphale released a sharp wail of ecstasy. And at that Crowley was coming so hard he could feel it in his bones.

  4. A fumbling, over-eager trip upstairs later, and Crowley found himself on his elbows and knees, grip white-knuckled in black silk sheets. Helpless, babbling, legs shaking with the effort of keeping himself upright, straining cock painfully hard. 

Aziraphale’s hands were loving-firm, spreading him apart, kneading at his flesh, the angel’s tongue swirling devoutly at his entrance. Crowley could feel the roughness of stubble graze across sensitive spit-slicked skin, each wanton, appreciative hum and moan thrumming through him like thunder.

Crowley’s own cries came in short, shaky hitches, thin and wavering like his sanity.




**Author's Note:**

> Of course, we all know that even if Aziraphale teased his dulcet demon a little at the use of a nickname, when all is said and done he would be very happy to support Crowley however he chose to identify himself ;)


End file.
